Residents campaign for 'party flats' ban

THEY house different groups of revellers every weekend, disturbing neighbours and keeping entire tenement blocks awake as raucous stag and hen parties rage.

Now campaigners are calling for so-called "party flats" to be banned and legislation brought in to restrict the number of occupants for short-term lets in shared occupancy blocks.

They believe that any properties that share an entrance stairwell with private dwellings should be regulated by authorities in the same way as long-let apartments.

As many as 15 people are regularly crammed into two or three-bedroom city-centre properties marketed by agencies hoping to attract the lucrative stag and hen party market in Edinburgh and Glasgow. Landlords can earn as much as 600 a night for the flats - most of them located in city centres, close to nightclubs and bars.

Large groups are also often packed into the flats during the Edinburgh Festival - when accommodation in the city is at a premium.

The problem is believed to be growing as properties that, following pressure from local residents, are not granted licenses to let long term to groups such as students under the Houses of Multiple Occupancy (HMO) regulations, are instead turned into party flats by landlords.

An investigation carried out by Scotland on Sunday found it easy for a large hen party group - who admitted they were likely to be rowdy - to rent a small flat in an Edinburgh tenement for the weekend.

One agent said noise was unlikely to be an issue unless our 15-strong group brought back "loads of strange people" to the three-bedroom, one-bathroom flat.

Another eased our "bridesmaid's" concerns that her group could disturb the neighbours by telling her that her friends would be just one of a string of rowdy hen parties who occupied the property "every week".

Some new-build blocks in Edinburgh city centre are thought to be made up almost entirely of party flats - with only one or two owner-occupiers and the rest let out to groups.

In other tenements, landlords who have bought properties for long-term lets are struggling to retain tenants as their clients are disturbed by the occupants of adjacent weekend-let flats.

A spokesman for the Scottish Association of Landlords said some owners were buying properties specifically for this purpose.

"Unlike the long-term letting market, they are not governed by any legislation and they can pack as many people as they like into a small flat," he said.

"Obviously anyone living anywhere can have a party, but the difference with this, for flats that are catering specifically for the market, is that there are parties going on every night that there are people renting the flats."Current legislation does not put any restriction on the number of people who can occupy rented properties, as long as they are let for less than 30 days.

In contrast, the long-term rental sector has to conform to HMO rules, which require landlords to be registered, and for fire and other safety regulations to be met if they are letting their property to a group of three or more people who are not related.

Bruce Borthwick, a former committee member of the Old Town Community Council, said he has been plagued by rowdy short-term tenants of two flats next to his home on Calton Road for the past four years.

"During the first six years we lived there, it was a very peaceful close," he said. "Now we have two party flats and it is a completely different story.

"It is not just at weekends. People visit Edinburgh every day of the week and they are on holiday. And it is happening everywhere - Aberdeen, Dundee, Glasgow. They are all becoming known as festival cities for various reasons, and it seems like there is a festival every day."

Borthwick, who is leading the campaign for legislative reform, plans to write to First Minister Alex Salmond to appeal for new regulations to be brought in to restrict the occupancy of flats. He said: "There must be no sacrifice of city-orientated families' life quality on the altar of our legislators believing that the tourism industry is supremely important - while we are fit to be trampled as an inconvenience."

Letting agent David Alexander said he backed calls for legislation for short lets.

He said: "I think it is a bigger problem than people realise. The problem is when some people go down the route of HMO licensing but are turned down and then start to rent out to short-term party letters. Sometimes residents feel they have won the battle - but they have actually lost the war."

Councils were granted powers earlier this year to seek anti-social behaviour orders against owners who let out noisy party flats.

But Lothians MSP Sarah Boyack, who successfully campaigned for the new legislation, said the rules had yet to be properly enforced.

"It is a horrendous situation that city-centre residents are experiencing and what we need is for the council and the police to make sure that the legislation is being properly enforced," she said.